Under then governor Sir Mervyn King, the Bank initially pumped £75bn of new money into the financial system by buying government bonds in an attempt to limit the worst effects of the crisis.

QE was ultimately expanded to become a £375bn programme, which was also left unchanged by the MPC on Thursday.

Philip Shaw, economist at Investec, said: “On the sixth anniversary of the introduction of QE and near zero interest rates, the MPC left policy unchanged at this month’s meeting.

“While of course it is possible that our medium-term forecasts are blown off course, our central view remains that the committee will begin raising the Bank rate in November this year, about three months earlier than currently factored into the yield curve.”

Any other move would have been major shock to the markets, despite the fact that six years on the emergency is over. Britain is out of recession, unemployment is falling, and the economy is growing at an annual rate of close to 3%.

But with inflation at a record low of 0.3%, wage growth weak, and some parts of the economy as yet to regain pre-crisis levels, the pressure is off governor Mark Carney to raise rates yet.

Carney has however made it clear that as the economy begins to get back on its feet - barring a huge economic shock - the next move in monetary policy will be a rate rise.